On the stupid moral panic over mocking Tim Tebow.

His story before November 2010 has drama all its own, and what happens over the next few chapters should be good, too. But taken all together, all at once, what happened in between—over the last 12 months—is as incredible as anything we ever see in sports.

Ah, but to what does John Brodie owe his strong right arm? Hold on to your hip flasks, sports fans. If one is to believe Brodie himself, and there is no cause to doubt him, a large part of his success in piloting the 49ers last year to their first title (NFC, Western Division) was due to a gnomish wizard who can wing a pigskin approximately nine yards on the fly, run from scrimmage at minus five yards per carry and block with all the rugged authority of a roll of Charmin.

When he succeeds he is a demigod, and when he fails he is some conflagration of moral failure, character desertion, and “everything wrong about this country.” Before you even get to any identifying characteristics of Tim Tebow, you’re already cheek-to-jowl with stupid thanks to his chosen job on the football field. Quarterbacks are to stupid people as trash bins are to hungry bears: they’re going to attack them with love or with malice, and the results look the same either way in the end.

The NFL’s greatest control freak is learning the hard way that he doesn’t control anything. On Sept. 8, when Manning would have typically been preparing for the Colts’ season opener, he was under general anesthesia in Los Angeles, his neck sliced open, as Dr. Robert Watkins Sr. and his son, Dr. Robert Watkins Jr., placed a piece of bone from Manning’s hip between two collapsed vertebrae. Recovery is estimated at three months, so there’s a strong chance Manning won’t play this season — not unless the Colts are in playoff contention. Staring at his football mortality has rattled him. “Football is his god,” says one of Manning’s friends. “When your god is lifted away from you, how you handle it might change your life.”

A conversation about kickoffs, head injuries, and a quarterback’s neck.

A Friday night with NFL running back Clinton Portis:

It’s not as if he saw angels and decided to become one, no sham barf like that. “People don’t like perfect,” he says. “You gotta show that you can still stir shit up, get some negative pub.” But he did finally see the possibilities of his life, how full he could make it, as though he alone could know what it really meant to be, in his words, “a young man living.”

A fish tank in every room, for starters. His obsession with them also began in college, during his sophomore year, when his roommate bought one and suddenly their cinder-block cell felt like a pad. The most elaborate of his current collection has been reserved for his bedroom, where the magic happens. More specifically, it’s reserved for his bed, the headboard of which consists of an aquarium that nearly reaches the ceiling, a square-shouldered arch filled with salt water, coral, fish, and a freakishly large sea anemone that looks an awful lot like a gaping vagina.

Why are sportswriters so eager to tell aging stars they’ve “stayed too long” in the game?

The athlete in decline who decides to leave the game on his own timetable does no harm to anybody. What fan doesn’t enjoy seeing his favorite star one more time? Only sportswriters cherish storybook career-finishes. They want Ted Williams to hit a home run in his last at-bat, because that’s a prettier story to write than chronicling a superstar who goes out stumbling—like Willie Mays. If sportswriters had their way, every star would die of Lou Gehrig disease during his last dance on the field, the court, or the rink.

You are not about to read a meditation on the virtues of Saint Matthew Ryan, savior of the Atlanta Falcons. First off, contrary to the general perception, he was never a choirboy. Altar boy, yes. Server of Holy Communion, yes. Only player in the history of traveling youth football teams to rise early on a trip to Disney World and beg a chaperone to take him to Mass, yes. But choirboy? Not a chance. You should hear him sing karaoke.

Then there is the torrent of money, a dollar a second, as much in a day as his average fan makes in a year. Never mind that he can look into the eyes of the other ten men in the huddle and gauge the mental and emotional condition of each one, tailoring the play accordingly; or that he can lift the mood of this city with the toss of a football; or that once, at the prodding of a family friend, he captivated the room for an hour with a dialogue about pottery. Never mind all that. When it comes to privileged suburban kids who attend costly private schools and go on to become professional football players who live on championship golf courses, I am reluctant to write about goodness. Because I’m afraid you wouldn’t believe me.

Noel Devine was the best high school running back in the nation, genetically blessed, a fully formed talent who reduced college coaches to the language of miracles. Five years later, he no longer seems destined for NFL stardom.

The Hall of Fame doesn’t exist.

On his blessing and his curse.

"I’ve been hated all my life, and I don’t think it’s going to stop now," Moss said. "When you’re up, people hate you. When you’re down, people love you."